Why Top Young Managers Are in a Nonstop Job Hunt (HBR source)

You might suspect that your best young managers are looking for a better gig—and you’re probably right. Research shows that today’s most-sought-after early-career professionals are constantly networking and thinking about the next step, even if they seem fully engaged. And employee-development programs aren’t making them happy enough to stay.

We reached these conclusions after conducting face-to-face interviews and analyzing two large international databases created from online surveys of more than 1,200 employees. We found that young high achievers—30 years old, on average, and with strong academic records, degrees from elite institutions, and international internship experience—are antsy. Three-quarters sent out résumés, contacted search firms, and interviewed for jobs at least once a year during their first employment stint. Nearly 95% regularly engaged in related activities such as updating résumés and seeking information on prospective employers. They left their companies, on average, after 28 months.

And who can blame them? Comparing the peripatetic managers’ salary histories with those of peers who stayed put, we found that each change of employer created a measurable advantage in pay; in fact, a job change was the biggest single determinant of a pay increase. This represents a significant difference from the past. Job hopping has long been viewed as a shortcut to the top, but research showed that was a myth for earlier generations, who paid a price in terms of promotions and often saw their salaries suffer as well.

The Career-development Gap

We asked young managers: On a scale of 1 to 5, how important are these items to you? We also asked to what extent their employers provide them. The biggest discrepancies are (not surprisingly) in the areas that cost the most money and time.

Dissatisfaction with some employee-development efforts appears to fuel many early exits. We asked young managers what their employers do to help them grow in their jobs and what they’d like their employers to do, and found some large gaps. Workers reported that companies generally satisfy their needs for on-the-job development and that they value these opportunities, which include high-visibility positions and significant increases in responsibility. But they’re not getting much in the way of formal development, such as training, mentoring, and coaching—things they also value highly.

Why the disconnect? We think it’s because formal training is costly and can take employees off the job for short periods of time. Employers are understandably reluctant to make big investments in workers who might not stay long. But this creates a vicious circle: Companies won’t train workers because they might leave, and workers leave because they don’t get training. By offering promising young managers a more balanced menu of development opportunities, employers might boost their inclination to stick around.